


Pack Ally

by dunbar



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Scott-Centric
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-15
Updated: 2017-09-15
Packaged: 2018-12-30 00:43:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,568
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12096990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dunbar/pseuds/dunbar
Summary: Scott starts to see that the bond between Liam and Theo is more than just them tolerating each other.





	Pack Ally

**Author's Note:**

> i'm emotional about the fact that theo as of 6x17 no longer seems to care about joining scott's pack or even being trusted by scott, he just wants to be around liam and keep him safe??? iconic i love it so here's this little drabble about scott noticing all that

Scott, despite his kind and forgiving nature, couldn't trust Theo. Why would he? A lot of people had tried to kill him and his pack before, but the way Theo did it—from the inside—made it different. It was harder to forgive because Theo had been a friend and ally, someone they all trusted, and because of that broken trust, Scott just couldn't come around. But in a war, allies were hard to come by and his pack needed everyone they could find.

No one seemed to like it. Malia wanted to kill him every chance she got, though she wasn't quite as aggressive as she was initially. Lydia was wary, and stayed away from him at all costs. Stiles freaked out irritatedly over the phone when he first found out, and told Scott to tell Liam he was a variety of things, ranging from "a dumbass" to "totally out of his freakin' mind" for bringing him back.

Liam _was_ different with Theo though. He had even Malia beat on the amount of fighting and violence; every time the two of them talked in front of the pack it ended in some kind of fighting. But Scott knew his beta, meaning he knew well enough that Theo somehow never managed to actually anger Liam. They would say mean things, so aggressively that there could be no doubt they were intended to hurt the other, but at the same time, they never really managed to say anything actually hurtful. Scott, having spent time with both of them, knew they both had weaknesses. Liam tended to lose it if anyone brought up his mental health, while Theo only really lost his temper if his sister was brought up needlessly. Yet neither ever went there, or even close. Their arguments were petty at best, usually sounding something like, _“No, you were the one who came up with that stupid plan that didn’t work, not me,”_ back and forth until one of them eventually gave up.

Liam defended Theo to no end back when the Ghost Riders were in Beacon Hills, defending his right to live and then, later, his right to freedom. But once the threat was gone, Theo left the second Scott gave up on arguing with Liam and let him walk out the front door. Scott wasn’t going to pretend he understood what had happened between them in the hospital, because Liam told him off bitterly when he asked as they listened to Theo get into his truck outside and leave, and then he’d pretty much completely isolated himself from the entire pack for a couple weeks, save for sometimes inviting Mason over to his house.

Scott didn’t understand a lot of things about Liam, even fewer lately; he’d been so preoccupied with the hunters and the Anuk-Ite and college it felt like he barely talked to him. And honestly, Liam had kind of clung on to Theo. He saw the way sometimes their fights ended in laughter—real laughter, coming from even Theo, who Scott had never even seen genuinely smiling before recently. He noticed the way they hovered near each other in a room, even when there was plenty of open space, so close that they would brush up against each other. He saw how they whispered to each other, commentating in the back of conversations they weren’t deeply involved in. And when they were involved in a talk, Scott saw the way they’d get lost talking to each other, building on top of each other’s points and looking only between themselves like they’d forgotten they weren’t the only people in the room for a short time before realizing that everyone was still listening, and then, they’d fall silent and let the conversation continue, Liam looking sheepish, Theo with a small smirk.

Sometimes, it was hard not to feel okay with their friendship when Scott saw the way they looked at each other when they thought no one was looking, and how they talked when they thought no one was listening. When attention was on them, they’d still get into their useless and dramatic fights, but when things felt more private, they actually made a good pair. Watching Theo stare at Liam when he started going off on some tangent about either something that really interested him or really pissed him off was like seeing a whole new side of him.

But still, Scott was concerned. He wasn’t sure he’d ever stop being concerned. Liam was his beta, and Theo had taken advantage of that before. And as much as things looked and felt different, Theo _had_ fooled them all before. 

It wasn’t until later that Scott realized that Theo and Liam weren’t just a pair who worked well together. They weren’t even just good friends. They needed each other. That was what surprised Scott most. He’d seen the signs already, like how the tension eased out of Liam every time Theo vocally agreed with his contributions to any pack meeting. But it was deeper than just the little things, and Scott was completely unaware of the importance of their relationship until he watched his beta flip out at some hunter, some _kid_ maybe a year older than Liam, who was dragged into the war as much as anyone else was nowadays.

“Liam, calm down,” Scott warned gently, watching as Liam held the kid against the wall looking ready to tear him in half. He stepped forward, prepared to pull him off if it came to that even though it’d probably result in Liam attacking him next, but instead a hand pushed him back again. Theo walked up to Liam like it was the most casual thing in the world, paying no mind to the hunter like he wasn’t even there, similar to the way they always spoke to each other like no one else was around lately.

“You really gotta give me a heads up if you wanna go through with this,” Theo started, standing right next to Liam with his arms crossed. “And what’d I tell you about witnesses? Scott’s right there.”

Scott blinked at the sight in front of them, not sure he wasn’t imagining it, like maybe the hunter kid had secretly caused wolfsbane induced hallucinations or something similar. But it felt real, even if he had absolutely no clue what exactly Theo was saying or what the context was for it, if there was any. Liam didn’t ease up though, he just growled at the kid again and ignored Theo’s words.

Theo just whispered, “Liam, come on,” as he took the arm closest to him and jerked Liam back so hard he stumbled a bit, and that was enough to snap him out of it almost completely. Theo didn’t let go of his arm though, and just loosened the grip into a gentle and comforting hand instead.

“You good?” Theo asked quietly, once again ignoring the kid as he slid down against the wall and whimpered loudly in some combination of fear and relief.

Liam avoided eye contact and had his usual post-anger episode expression, a face Scott had seen more than once. He looked guilty and apologetic, but afraid too. He didn’t have his usual shield of anger, and it was probably the most vulnerable he would ever be around Scott and most people. Still, he gave a shaky nod.

“Hey,” Theo lifted his other hand and put it under his chin, tilting his head up and forcing Liam to look at him. “Don’t beat yourself up, you didn’t even hurt him.”

When Liam responded with a small, grateful smile, Theo let go of him and turned around to face Scott like nothing had happened.

“We’re working on it,” He said with a smirk, and Scott couldn’t clear his mind enough to think of how to even reply to Theo’s comment, or the entire situation he’d just seen play out in front of him. Liam fidgeted with his hands, looking down with a slight blush like he could feel Scott glancing between both boys. “We’ll let you deal with him, then.” Theo motioned towards the hunter, and then nodded at Liam to follow him as he walked out of the room. In that moment, Scott finally made the connection—Theo was Liam’s anchor. Liam had Mason, and no one would ever take his place, but they were in the middle of a supernatural war against humans with dangerous weapons, and the amount of time that Liam got to spend with his best friend was minimal, because Mason’s safety always came first. On top of that, Liam’s mental state had its ups and downs in general, and now was definitely a low point. He needed Theo, and Theo needed him, and that was it.

So maybe Scott couldn’t trust Theo as a person, and maybe they’d never be friends, but he could trust him to be good to Liam, because Theo was no longer doing this for anything or anyone else. He wasn’t doing it to stay alive, or to join the pack, because he didn’t care and it was so obvious. He just cared about Liam, they cared about each other, and that was enough to make him more than an ally of circumstance because of the war; he was a friend of the pack. And for the first time, Scott dropped all his doubts about letting Theo walk free.


End file.
